Four-time Olympic medallist Louis Smith may face "suspension or expulsion" by British Gymnastics over a video in which he apparently mocks Islam.

Article: The 50m (164ft) tall structures are set to disappear at Dunford Bridge in South Yorkshire as part of National Grid plans to remove ugly overhead lines.
The project has shortlisted 12 stretches of pylons in eight areas across the country.
A final decision on the Peak District plan will be made in March.
The pylons can be seen across a 12.8km (8m) stretch of the national park, starting near Penistone in South Yorkshire and ending at Tintwistle in Derbyshire.
Steve Knight-Gregson, from the National Grid, said: "We have looked at national parks in England and Wales where we have overhead lines and a panel of experts and landscape architects have helped narrow it down to this shortlist.
"In the Peak District, this section of line is one of those that's made it through for further work."
The scheme is funded by Ofgem, which will claw back the cost through an increase in customers' bills.
Plans to remove the pylons include replacing overhead lines with underground cables, screening lines from viewpoints and re-routing lines.
Anne Robinson, from Friends of the Peak District, said: "There [were] a lot of studies done before this was set up to make sure the customers were behind it.
"There's no doubt that customers are willing to pay and have a very small sum added to their electricity bills a year to make sure these landscapes are enhanced."
Pylons were introduced in the Peak District national park in the 1960s.
John Scott, from the Peak District National Park Authority, welcomed the news that they could be removed.
He said: "These measures would greatly improve the appearance of the valley, which runs through some of the wildest moorland landscape in the Peak District.
"The pylon towers and the overhead cables are some of the most intrusive modern elements in a valley. This is clearly a very welcome proposal which would be of great benefit to the special character of this part of the Peak District."
Other parks and areas of outstanding natural beauty shortlisted for the work include:
Nick Clack, from the  Campaign to...

Summary: A stretch of power lines running through the Peak District national park could be buried underground as part of a £500m scheme.
###
Article: If Greece went, would others be the next targets in the financial markets? Would they find themselves pushed relentlessly towards the eurozone's exit?
This time we are actually closer to Greece leaving, and yet there is very little sign of the dreaded contagion. In 2011 and the following year there was a lot of it about. Not so today.
Why? It's largely down to the European Central Bank (ECB).
But perhaps the first thing to spell out is what that earlier contagion looked like.
The key element was the impact on the market for government debt, the bond market.  Investors worried that some governments might struggle to maintain their debt payments.
They also worried that if any of those countries did end up leaving the euro, the debts would be repaid in a national currency that would in all likelihood lose value.
Inevitably investors buying the bonds concerned wanted compensation for the risk in the shape of a higher return or yield.
When the return on government bonds in the market rises, it generally means the government will have to pay higher borrowing costs when they next raise money in the markets.
There's a vicious cycle that can get going in these circumstances.
If a government's ability to pay its debts is looking suspect that tends to raise its borrowing costs, which in turn makes it harder to maintain the payments, making borrowing more expensive still.
That is what happened when the eurozone turmoil was at its worst.  A benchmark often used is the return or yield on government debt that is due for repayment in ten years' time. To take two countries at the eye of the earlier storm: for Italy that figure peaked at 7.2%, for Spain 7.5%.
Earlier this year those figures went below 2%. They are a little higher now but still at eminently sustainable levels.
The leading force behind that change is the European Central Bank.
In August 2012 it unveiled a programme with the characteristically snappy title of "Outright Monetary Transactions", or OMT - you might well respond with OMG!
What did it mean? The ECB was...

Summary: The last time Greece was on the brink, the word on lips around the eurozone was "contagion".
###
Article: But attempts to land may face a major hazard: jagged "blades" of ice up to 10m long.
A major US conference has heard the moon may have ideal conditions for icy spikes called "penitentes" to form.
Scientists would like to send a lander down to sample surface regions where water wells up through the icy crust.
These areas could allow a robotic probe to sample a proxy for ocean water that lies several kilometres deep.
Details of the penitentes theory were announced as scientists outlined another proposal to explore the jovian moon with robotic spacecraft.
On Earth, these features (so named because of their resemblance to the pointed caps worn by "penitents" in Easter processions around the Spanish-speaking world) form in high altitude regions such as the Andes.
Here, the air is both cold and dry, allowing ice to sublimate (turn from a solid into vapour without passing through a liquid phase).
Penitentes begin to form when irregularities in the surface of the snow are enhanced by the Sun's energy. These furrows then act as a trap for solar radiation, and, as they deepen, the tall peaks are left behind.
Dr Daniel Hobley, from the University of Colorado, who presented his research at the 44th Lunar and Planetary Science Conference in Texas on Tuesday, said the formation of penitentes also required the Sun to be overhead as much as possible.
Jupiter's moon
"Light coming in at a high angle will illuminate the sides of the blades, causing them to retreat away," he explained.
On Earth, this restricts them to between 30 degrees latitude from the equator.
"Europa is very strongly tidally locked to Jupiter and Jupiter is very strongly tidally locked to the plane of the Sun. So the Sun is always coming down straight from above on Europa," said Dr Hobley, so the moon fulfils this requirement nicely.
He added: "You need a strong thermal gradient between the spike at the top of the penitente and the pit at the bottom. So any mechanism that acts to suppress that, i.e. warm cloudy days - or hot air - will also kill them."
With...

Summary: Jupiter's icy moon Europa is a prime target for future space missions as it harbours a buried ocean that could have the right conditions for life.
###
Article: Andreas Schleicher, in charge of the international Pisa tests, faced questions from MPs about how he thought England's academy system was working.
Mr Schleicher said the global evidence suggested local flexibility for schools was linked to higher results.
He described free-standing academies as a "promising trend".
Describing the features of the most successful education systems around the world, he praised "local discretion" for head teachers and school leaders combined with a shared expectation of high standards.
The flexibility of individual schools needed to be balanced by a strong culture of transparency and accountability, he told MPs.
The House of Commons Education Select Committee was taking evidence from Mr Schleicher in its inquiry into academies and free schools in England.
He gave his broad endorsement of the academy system in England, where state-funded schools are given more control over their budgets and flexibility over their curriculum.
But Mr Schleicher warned that autonomy on its own was not a way of improving schools.
He pointed to the example of the United States as evidence that more autonomy could be "part of the solution or else part of the problem".
In the US, the negative side could be isolation and a lack of coherence in maintaining standards, he said.
"You need a very strong education system to make autonomy work, you can't leave it to market forces alone," he told MPs.
Within Europe, he said that autonomy was linked to high performance in the Netherlands but not in Sweden, which has seen a fall in its Pisa test ranking.
He told MPs that high-performing systems had a culture of expecting good results from all pupils - and that there was nothing inevitable about the under-achievement of children from poorer families.
Within England, he commended the achievement of the former London Challenge initiative, which had seen schools in the capital improve more quickly than elsewhere in the country.
In England, academies are now the most common type of secondary school.
There have been...

Summary: The most successful education systems combine local autonomy for schools with strong public accountability, the OECD's education expert has told MPs.
###
Article: Simon Reynolds, of Farnham in Surrey, did not return to Sheffield Crown Court on Thursday and a manhunt was launched.
Reynolds, who was found guilty of four counts of theft, handed himself in at a police station in Sheffield on Monday.
He was vicar at All Saints Church in Darton when the thefts took place and has been sentenced to 32 months.

Summary: A vicar who went on the run after being convicted of pocketing £24,000 of church fees has been jailed for almost three years.
###
Article: The video, filmed by Smith and obtained by a newspaper, appears to show him laughing while retired gymnast Luke Carson mimics Islamic prayer practices.
Smith, who won pommel horse silver at Rio 2016, later said he was "deeply sorry" for his "thoughtless actions".
British Gymnastics said: "We will be investigating the behaviours reported."
In a statement, the governing body added: "Members who break our code of conduct can face suspension or expulsion from our organisation."
Smith, who has won medals at the past three Olympic Games, has already been censured twice this year by British Gymnastics.
In April, the 27-year-old apologised for questioning the judging at the British Championships, where he was beaten to pommel gold by Max Whitlock.
He was also reprimanded in June for posting an image on social media of an American gymnast, who was 16 when the photograph was taken, accompanied by a comment British Gymnastics said was "unbefitting to a participant".
That reprimand was to remain on his record for two years with the added warning "any further misconduct may lead to even greater consequences".
Smith is one of Britain's best-known gymnasts and won the BBC show Strictly Come Dancing in 2012.
He is taking a break from the sport and is instead touring as a guest celebrity on the Keep Dancing stage production.

Summary:


An organic farmer has persuaded Tesco to take down a photograph of him from its website.

Article: Current guidelines were written in 1994 and should be updated to reflect legal changes and the effect of social media, the Universities UK taskforce said.
Key areas to be considered include better reporting systems and creating a "zero-tolerance culture", it said.
The National Union of Students (NUS) and the government welcomed the review.
Though not legally binding, universities often rely on the so-called Zellick guidelines when dealing with allegations of sexual violence or harassment between students. They have been criticised for causing universities to leave investigation of complaints to the police rather than investigating them themselves.
The guidelines' author, Prof Graham Zellick, has said they are still valid, but that they only cover discipline, and not other requirements such as a system of recording sexual assaults.
But BBC education editor Branwen Jeffreys said there had been increasing pressure for action from campaigners who accuse universities of being "more concerned with reputation than supporting students".
The Universities UK taskforce said "significant elements" the Zellick guidelines were still useful to universities.
But it said developments including the Equality Act 2010 and "changes in the wider social environment, including the significant impact of social media" meant guidelines should be reviewed and updated.
The taskforce will produce a final report on violence, harassment and hate crime later this year.
NUS women's officer Susuana Amoah said: "We hope this review will lead to the creation of a new set of guidelines centring around the welfare of survivors rather than institutional reputation."
Sarah Green, of the End Violence Against Women Coalition, welcomed the recognition that "it is time for universities to change the way they respond to allegations of rape and other abuse and harassment".
The Department for Business, Innovation and Skills welcomed the "progress" the taskforce had made and said it looked forward to seeing the final report.

Summary: Universities should overhaul guidelines on dealing with allegations of sexual assaults and harassment, according to a taskforce set up by the government.
###
Article: Cases have included officers snooping on their children and ex-wives, social media blunders and breaching data protection regulations.
More than 100 staff were sacked and nearly 200 resigned as a result of breaches in England and Wales.
Avon and Somerset Police reported the highest number of incidents with 289.
In one case revealed by the force, a chief inspector received management action for being "negligent when disclosing personal information".
A PC was subject to a complaint, also with Avon and Somerset Police, when they disclosed the name of an individual "to the media after they had made it known that they wished to remain anonymous". The complaint was later withdrawn.
*Data relates to a longer period than other forces' statistics
Source: Press Association Freedom of Information request
Police forces from across England and Wales recorded a total of 2,031 cases of data protection breaches between January 2009 and October 2013, figures obtained by the Press Association showed.
Investigations led to 186 resignations, while 113 were sacked. At least 34 of those investigated were inspectors or chief inspectors, while 474 were civilian officers.
Of 43 police forces contacted, 35 responded with information.
Javed Khan, chief executive of Victim Support, said: "It is very worrying to think that the personal data of victims of crime - who are often extremely vulnerable - might be being accessed and used inappropriately by people in a position of trust."
Avon and Somerset Police's corporate information spokesman, Ian Marsh, said: "We take an extremely robust approach to the recording and investigation of alleged Data Protection Act breaches.
"We recognise police integrity is of the upmost importance to the public and would like to reassure people that any potential breach is investigated fully."
The force said that the figure of 289 incidents relates to a 55-month period and that in 72 of the episodes there was no case to answer because no breach had been committed.
Mr Marsh added that "in the spirit of being...

Summary: Hundreds of police staff, including high-ranking officers, have been censured for breaching data protection laws over the past five years.
###
Article: Property consultant Colliers International found 76 out of the UK's main towns and shopping centres will see an increase in their rates bill.
Some parts of London will see an increase of more than 400%, it says.
The winners, mainly in the Midlands and north of England, will see business rates plummet, it adds.
Newport in south Wales could see bills fall by some 80%, the report found.
"The business rates losers are found only in London and the South East and it could turn highly profitable stores, including independent retailers, into failing businesses," said John Webber, ratings expert at Colliers International.
Business rates are a tax based on property values. They are usually revalued every five years.
The last revaluation in England and Wales was in 2010 but this year's revaluation was controversially postponed to 2017.
The Government's Valuation Office Agency is busy updating its figures but Colliers has done its own research on how the rating revaluation will affect High Street retailers, based on analysis of rental data from 2010 to 2015.
It says it found big variations across the country:
Marlow faces an increase of 58% in rateable value, followed by Guildford at 42%, and Brighton up by 18.5%.
But Rochdale in Greater Manchester, hit hard by the economic downturn,  will see a decrease of 30%. Kidderminster in the West Midlands is down by 42%.
And in London, it is Dover Street which is the biggest loser, with an increase of 415%. Brixton faces a potential 128% increase in rateable value, although Ealing will see a decrease of 46%.
Mr Webber believes some retailers are going to be in for a nasty shock when the business rates change in 2018.
"Business rates is a major cost for retailers and it's really important that they are able to budget for these once-in-a-generation changes," he adds.
The government has promised a review of the current system and will deliver its findings by next year's Budget.
Business rates are expected to raise around £28bn for the Treasury's coffers this year, more than the sum...

Summary: High Streets in the UK are set to face radical changes in the amount of money they pay in business rates in future, new research suggests.
###
Article: Incoming NAHT leader Kim Johnson, who is an academy head, says he knows the merits of autonomy and freedom.
But in a letter to the Daily Telegraph, he warns that the programme is costly and the benefits uncertain.
The government says it wants all schools to be able to enjoy academy freedoms.
It has published plans to require all schools to become academies by 2022.
But there has been opposition from teachers, Labour politicians and from some Conservative MPs and councillors.
Now the National Association of Head Teachers, which mainly represents primary schools, has expressed its concerns.
Mr Johnson says in the letter: "I will happily persuade my colleagues of the merits of autonomy and freedom. But I have doubts about forcing every school in England to convert to academy status.
"The cost of this initiative is high and the benefits are uncertain. Smaller schools could suffer.
"We should be devoting our energy to what happens inside the classroom rather than top-down structural reform and I'll be disappointed if legislation is rushed into the Queen's Speech."
He told the BBC many schools had made the decision that working within a local authority structure worked for them and their community.
"Why change that? If the choice is become an academy because you know that actually you can improve the quality of what's going on, then that would seem the right thing to do. So give the choice. Trust in us. We do know what we're doing," he said.
His comments come as Education Secretary Nicky Morgan is preparing to address the NAHT conference in Birmingham.
Earlier this week, she defended the plans in front of the Education Select Committee, saying they would create "a strong, consistent system".
A dual system with academies running alongside local authority schools would be less efficient, she said.
Russell Hobby, general secretary of the NAHT, said there were concerns from some members who were leading good or outstanding schools.
"They've had the chance to convert to academy status for five years or more - they've...

Summary: A head teachers' leader has expressed doubts about government plans to force all schools in England to become academies.
###
Article: Eleven million documents were leaked from one of the world's most secretive companies, Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca. They revealed in detail how parts of the offshore industry work.
We asked you what stories over the last 12 months you wanted to hear more about and in response many of you asked - what happened as a result of the Panama Papers?
So we spoke to the journalists who brought the story to the world.
The first casualty was the Prime Minister of Iceland, Sigmundur Gunnlaugsson, who resigned only days after the leaks showed he and his wife owned an offshore company that he had not declared on entering parliament.
Other world leaders, including Russian President Vladimir Putin and Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, addressed their countries to denounce the leaks and any allegations of being linked to money laundering.
In the UK, it caused political embarrassment for then-Prime Minister David Cameron, who admitted that his family had benefited from a legal offshore fund set up by his late father, Ian.
Authorities in the US and countries in Europe and Asia launched investigations into whether their rules were breached by those named in the leak.
Through it all, Mossack Fonseca has maintained it operates beyond reproach and has never been charged with wrongdoing.
Bastian Obermayer and Frederik Obermaier are the two journalists at the heart of the leaks.
One night in 2014, Mr Obermayer was looking after his sick children when he received a message.
"Interested in data?" it said.
That data turned out to be millions of documents from Mossack Fonseca and the shell companies it sets up for wealthy people. The whistleblowers called themselves John Doe and their identity remains secret.
The journalists received hundreds of files a day and were soon overwhelmed with information from hundreds of thousands of offshore companies. They involved an international journalists' network and teams of reporters from around the world, including the BBC.
Eight months on from the publishing and broadcasting of the...

Summary: This year saw the release of the biggest leak of documents in history, when the Panama Papers were made public.
###
Article: Martin Godfrey said he had never supplied Tesco and was surprised to find the picture being used on the firm's website.
The supermarket chain acquired the image through an agency.
A Tesco spokesperson said: "We work tirelessly to support farmers and suppliers and we are sorry for any upset that has been caused."
Mr Godfrey, from Okehampton, Devon, said the picture was originally taken when he was working for Shillingford Organics near Exeter, but was later sold on as a stock image.
Tesco later got the image through its advertising agency, which acquired it from Getty Images.
Mr Godfrey owns an organic produce business and campaigns with the Land Workers' Alliance.
He said the picture of him pulling carrots on the organic farm was a "marketing blunder".
"This inappropriate use of the organic farming image and myself... was taken whilst working at Shillingford Organics some 10 years ago, which has no connection to Tesco whatsoever," he said.
The image has been removed from the supermarket's online promotions, but remains printed in some of its magazines.
Tesco has promised not to use the image in future promotions.
It has offered to donate Â£1,000 to a local charity, Mr Godfrey said.
He said he appreciated the supermarket was "doing something about food waste" and suggested other chains should do the same.

Summary:

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Conservationists are to visit Skye to learn more about otter habitats ahead of a proposed reintroduction of the mammals to Japan.

Article: Those falling below the targets, including some rated as "good" by Ofsted, will be labelled as "coasting".
The new threshold for secondary schools will require 60% of pupils to achieve five good GCSEs, including English and maths.
"I'm unapologetic about shining a spotlight on complacency," said Mrs Morgan.
"For too long a group of coasting schools, many in leafy areas with more advantages than schools in disadvantaged communities, have fallen beneath the radar," said the education secretary.
These might be "very good schools but young people are not fulfilling all of their potential".
The education department says that "hundreds" of schools will have to raise their results to meet these higher expectations.
But head teachers' leader Brian Lightman said the definitions for this new category were "muddled and unfair".
Schools falling into this coasting category will be given help to improve, but those that fail to make progress could be turned into academies. The classification will be based on three years of results.
The plans, introduced in the Education and Adoption Bill, are aimed at raising standards in hundreds of schools that are achieving adequate exam results, but where the government believes achievement could be much higher.
There will also be a target for primary schools to stay above this coasting label, requiring 85% of pupils to achieve the expected standard in their national curriculum tests.
As well as those failing to reach these targets, schools will be labelled as "coasting" if a below-average proportion of pupils are making the expected amount of progress.
The plans are aimed at pushing schools to achieve more than the "artificial borderline" of sufficient numbers of good grades at GCSE and in primary tests.
Mrs Morgan says schools should be "stretching every pupil to unlock their potential".
Schools falling into the coasting category will be expected to produce a "credible plan to improve" and will be given assistance by "expert" head teachers.
Those that do not improve will be turned...

Summary: Schools in England will face tougher exam targets, under plans announced by Education Secretary Nicky Morgan.
###
Article: He was visiting Scotland on Tuesday to speak in support of the union after opinion polls put the two sides in next week's referendum neck-and-neck.
The three main UK parties have all proposed extra powers for Scotland if its people vote to stay in the UK.
But former Plaid Cymru leader Lord Wigley said Wales should have confidence to push for independence.
Mr Jones has urged the people of Scotland to reject independence and help "rebuild" the UK.
Asked if he feared the impact of a yes vote, Mr Jones said: "Yes, I do."
He said Scotland brought "balance" to the UK, and its population "seems a lot bigger" than Wales' "because of the weight it carries in the UK".
Scotland's population is 5.3m, while Wales' is 3.1m.
He added: "With Scotland gone, a lot of work would need to be done in order to make sure what is left was stable going forward. You'd have a very big nation in England, and two much smaller nations in Wales and Northern Ireland.
"You have to work out what it would be called, work out what flag it uses. These things can be done, but I come back to the point: why do you need to do that? Why do you need to take the risk?"
Mr Jones accepted it had taken time for the pro-union parties to agree on "a common way forward", and called again for a constitutional convention to discuss the UK's future.
In an earlier interview on BBC Radio Wales, he said: "It's not all about fear... there is a positive alternative vision for Scotland."
Welsh Conservative leader Andrew RT Davies also called on Scottish voters to support the UK as a "positive example of social, economic and national union".
"Everyone can celebrate their own nationality but also get the strengths that the union has brought for the last 300 years," he said.
"We should be celebrating that and emphasising what exactly is on offer for the next 300 years of the most successful economic and social union the world has ever seen."
The former Plaid Cymru leader Lord Wigley said Wales should have the same confidence as Scotland in pushing for independence.
"If I...

Summary: First Minister Carwyn Jones has said he fears for Wales' future if Scotland votes for independence.
###
Article: Mr Warmbier died without recovering on Monday, having been brought back to the US last week. His family blames the North Korean authorities for his death.
US President Donald Trump called the North a "brutal regime".
A spokesman in Pyongyang was quoted by Reuters as saying Mr Warmbier's death was "a mystery".
Mr Warmbier, 22, a student at the University of Virginia, had been travelling with a tour group when he was arrested at Pyongyang airport in January 2016.
Accused of stealing a propaganda sign from a hotel, he was sentenced to 15 years of hard labour.
His family had no news of him until 13 June when Pyongyang announced he had been in a coma since his trial, attributing it to botulism.
More than 2,500 family, friends and well-wishers gathered for his funeral in Ohio on Thursday.
The North Korean spokesman quoted by Reuters suggested the student had returned to the US "in his normal state of health".
"The fact that Warmbier died suddenly in less than a week just after his return to the US in his normal state of health indicators is a mystery to us as well," he said.
Accusations that the student died because of torture and beating during his captivity were "groundless", he added.
A North Korean spokesman quoted by AFP news agency accused the US of mounting a "smear campaign".
"Our relevant agencies treat all criminals... thoroughly in accordance with domestic laws and international standards and Warmbier was not an exception," a spokesman for the National Reconciliation Council said.
"Those who have absolutely no idea about how well we treated Warmbier under humanitarian conditions dare to utter 'mistreatment' and 'torture'."
They say he suffered a "severe neurological injury", the most likely cause of which was a cardiopulmonary arrest that had cut the blood supply to the brain.
They say there was no evidence he suffered from botulism.
A post-mortem examination was not carried out at the request of the family.
The family maintain he died as a result of "awful torturous mistreatment".
Mr Warmbier's death...

Summary: The North Korean government has denied mistreating US student Otto Warmbier, who fell into a coma while being held in prison in the communist state.
###
Article: The RIFC chairman expressed his fears in an email to an associate of Sports Direct owner Mike Ashley.
Somers also asked why a funding offer had been changed to a "particularly stupid alternative".
Two weeks later, Ashley's £2m loan offer was accepted ahead of a loan offer from Brian Kennedy and the funding proposal made by the consortium.
In the correspondence, Somers referred to a "formal proposal of a deal from Dave King and my board are clamouring for a call to discuss it and no doubt approve it. A board on which James [Easdale] and I are a minority".
Somers also revealed that the consortium's proposal included board seats "which means Sandy, James [Easdale] and I will not survive on this board very much longer. Yes, you can vote them off at the next AGM but they can do a great deal of damage before then."
Describing himself as "very angry", Somers also said that he was prepared to terminate Sports Direct's retail contract.
The RIFC board was seeking funding to cover for a shortfall in season ticket sales. The consortium involving King wanted boardroom control in return for a £16m funding package. Kennedy was prepared to provide a £3m loan in return for security against the assets and one board place. Ashley's loan offer was also secured, and sought two board places.
The long-time Ashley associate Derek Llambias, who was previously managing director of Newcastle United - the club Ashley owns outright - is now chief executive of Rangers, having been appointed as a consultant then a non-executive director in the weeks following Ashley's loan offer being accepted.
David Somers responded to BBC Scotland: "The Dave King proposal started well but, as I stated, fell at the first hurdle of 'show me the money' and 'who are the eight people in your consortium'.
"Sadly this proposal quickly began to look more like one designed simply to impress the media rather than a proper proposal.
"The mystery to me is if Dave King really wants to support Rangers then why doesn't he buy some shares, then he can participate in...

Summary: David Somers was concerned that he would lose his seat on the Rangers International Football Club board if a consortium including Dave King was successful with a funding offer.
###
Article: The 20-part series, based on the books of Charles Dickens, started on Boxing Day with five million viewers but it fell to an average of two million.
The brainchild of former EastEnders' writer Tony Jordan, the drama brought together characters from books such as Oliver Twist, Bleak House and Great Expectations.
A BBC spokeswoman said the cancellation had been a "difficult" decision.
"We are incredibly proud of Dickensian and would like to thank all those involved in such an ambitious series.
"We sometimes have to make difficult decisions to make room for new shows and it won't be returning for a second series."
The show starred Stephen Rea as Inspector Bucket from Bleak House trying to solve the murder of Jacob Marley from A Christmas Carol, played by Peter Firth.
The cast also included Tuppence Middleton as a young Miss Havisham from Great Expectations and Caroline Quentin as Mrs Bumble from Oliver Twist.
But viewers complained about the lack of a fixed time slot in the schedules for the programme.
Before the series aired Jordan said he had already scripted 60 episodes and was banking on the BBC commissioning more, pointing out that Dickens created in excess of 2,000 characters and he had only used 30.
Jordan, managing director of Red Planet Pictures who made the drama, admitted he was "disappointed" that they would not be making a second series.
"We are hugely proud of what we achieved in the first series of Dickensian and would like to thank everyone who helped us create a truly special and unique drama."

Summary: BBC One's big-budget drama Dickensian has been cancelled after one series.
###
Article: Otters were declared extinct on the Japanese islands by its Ministry of the Environment in August 2012.
The Skye-based International Otter Survival Fund (IOSF) has been helping with the reintroduction preparations.
Dr Takahiro Murakami, who will lead the Japanese visit to Scotland, has never seen otters in the wild.
The Japanese otter was believed to be either a subspecies of the Eurasian otter or possibly even a separate species.
Conservationists have suggested reintroducing otters to Hokkaido, an island in north Japan.
IOSF supports conservation projects across the world.
It also rescues and raises orphaned otter cubs.

Summary:


Two men arrested on suspicion of sexual offences against underage girls between 1994 and 2003 have been bailed.

Article: Construction workers are required to hold a CSCS card to prove skills and a knowledge of health and safety.
But a joint BBC London/Newsnight investigation found organised cheating.
Carl Rhymer, of the Construction Industry Training Board (CITB), one test provider, said 6,000 card-holders would be required to re-sit the exam.
CSCS (Construction Skills Certification Scheme) cards are widely seen as the UK's flagship scheme for certifying builders and are required by nine of the UK's biggest construction companies as well as Crossrail and Heathrow.
But the investigation found numerous test centres were offering guaranteed passes for cash, enabling workers lacking English to obtain qualifications and entry to dangerous construction sites.
During the investigation the BBC exposed Wep HSE, in Ealing, after its award-winning director, Garet Estensen, read exam answers from a big screen, instructing candidates: "Follow me on screen, guys. I'm going to shout the correct answer."
Confronted with the evidence, Mr Estensen made no comment.
The other two centres exposed during the investigation were Future Training 4 Jobs in Ilford and Training Xpress Limited in Colindale. Both have now been suspended from testing.
Mr Rhymer, director of delivery and customer engagement at the CITB, said it was aware of fraudulent incidents and was "tackling this head-on".
He said: "We are working hard with CSCS and the police to crack down on fraud and we are accelerating existing plans to install mandatory CCTV in all testing centres.
"We've also increased the number of spot checks on centres, to act as a deterrent."
Mr Rhymer said following a review it had found the "vast majority" of tests were legitimate but it would "require 6,000 individuals to be retested... to eliminate any doubt".
But Alistair Donaghey, health, safety and environmental manager of Willmott Dixon, a construction company with a Â£1bn turnover said: "I'll never trust the scheme again."
Those required to re-sit the test will be issued with vouchers to cover the cost...

Summary: More than 6,000 builders issued with industry certificates will have to re-sit exams after the BBC uncovered the rigging of health and safety tests.
###
Article: Christopher Jones started a fire in his Park Avenue property after causing gas to build up for several days in April.
Perth Sheriff Court was told residents of eight flats were evacuated as a result.
Jones, 42, of Perth, will be sentenced later in June after admitting causing the explosion.
He also admitted a charge of stalking a woman at her home and various locations.
The court was told that Jones had attempted to take his own life by causing the explosion after losing his sight.
Depute fiscal Nicola Gillespie said gas engineers had been called to the premises several times after neighbours reported leaks.
She said:  "There was an explosion and smoke could be seen.  All the residents were evacuated.
"The accused was topless, wearing jeans and covered in soot.
"He had burns to his face, hands and neck.
"He said he had been sitting on the toilet when he lit a cigarette and the flat exploded."
Miss Gillespie said a joint investigation discovered a fire had been started deliberately in the bedroom and that Jones was not in the room when it exploded, as he would have been unlikely to survive the blast.
The fiscal said that the repair bill for each flat ran to "tens of thousands of pounds".
Solicitor David Holmes, defending, said: "He lost his sight and it has significantly deteriorated in the last year and he has found it difficult to adjust."
Sheriff William Wood remanded Jones in custody and deferred sentence for social work and psychiatric reports.

Summary: A man who deliberately caused a gas explosion in a block of flats in Dundee has been remanded in custody.
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Article: Raft of the Medusa, by Lucy and Jorge Orta, is based on a painting of the same name by Gericault, depicting the aftermath of a shipwreck.
The work is about "remembering the many lives lost at sea", the artists said.
Somewhere Becoming Sea, another exhibition at the same venue, explores Hull's relationship with the North Sea.
Read more stories from across Hull and East Yorkshire
Both exhibitions are part of Hull's City of Culture programme, and are taking place at Humber Street Gallery from 5 April.
Commenting on the exhibition, Ms Orta said the treacherous conditions faced by the doomed sailors in Gericault's work reminds us of the fateful journeys of slaves and migrants throughout history.
"Even more so today, we all play witness to the perilous journeys of the thousands of refugees navigating the oceans in search of a safe haven."
She said the exhibit related to Hull's maritime history, and its story moving forward.
The Raft of the Medusa exhibit is also said to incorporate debris from the Japanese tsunami in 2011, found washed up on the shores of Alaska four years later.
Steven Bode, curator of Somewhere Becoming Sea, said the exhibition explores Hull's longstanding place as a gateway to the North Sea.
He said: "Hull has been at the sharp end of some recent economic changes - the decline of the local fishing industry, shifting patterns of maritime trade - but it is also potentially at the forefront of a new relationship to the sea, through things like the green energy of wind turbines."

Summary: Sensory artwork featuring the "pungent smell of decaying rubber, seaweed, wooden planks and oil drums" has gone on display in Hull.
###
Article: A team was able to make the mice wrongly associate a benign environment with a previous unpleasant experience from different surroundings.
The researchers conditioned a network of neurons to respond to light, making the mice recall the unpleasant environment.
Reporting in Science, they say it could one day shed light into how false memories occur in humans.
The brains of genetically engineered mice were implanted with optic fibres in order to deliver pulses of light to their brain. Known as optogenetics, this technique is able to make individual neurons respond to light.
Just like in mice, our memories are stored in collections of cells, and when events are recalled we reconstruct parts of these cells - almost like re-assembling small pieces of a puzzle.
It has been well documented that human memory is highly unreliable, first highlighted by a study on eyewitness testimonies in the 70s.  Simple changes in how a question was asked could influence the memory a witness had of an event such as a car crash.
When this was brought to public attention, eyewitness testimonies alone were no longer used as evidence in court. Many people wrongly convicted on memory statements were later exonerated by DNA evidence.
Xu Liu of the RIKEN-MIT Center for Neural Circuit Genetics and one the lead authors of the study, said that when mice recalled a false memory, it was indistinguishable from the real memory in the way it drove a fear response in the memory forming cells of a mouse's brain.
The mouse is the closest animal scientists can easily use to analyse the brain, as though simpler, its structure and basic circuitry is very similar to the human brain.
Studying neurons in a mouse's brain could therefore help scientists further understand how similar structures in the human brain work.
"In the English language there are only 26 letters, but the combinations of letters make unlimited words and sentences, this is also true for memories," Dr Liu told BBC News.
"There are so many brain cells and for each individual memory,...

Summary: False memories have been implanted into mice, scientists say.
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Article: The energy select committee said environmental problems associated with it in the US could be overcome by tight regulation and good industry practice.
But the MPs said the UK government would need to be vigilant to ensure the technology did not pollute water or produce excessive greenhouse emissions.
Environmentalists said MPs should have called for a moratorium on shale gas.
Campaigners want a moratorium until research into allegations about the technology is complete.
Shale gas is significant to the UK in two ways. First, the massive expansion of shale gas in the US and also possibly in China may depress global gas prices and cause countries to favour gas over coal.
Some experts see this as a double-edged sword - low energy prices are a benefit, but might divert investment from the renewables and nuclear essential for the low-carbon future planned by the government.
The second issue over shale gas is one of energy security. The British Geological Survey estimates that onshore shale gas can supply 1.5 years of the UK's total gas needs.
The MPs say this is a useful but not major contribution - and they recommend that the government should encourage the development of offshore shale gas, where reserves may be far higher, albeit more costly to recover.
Test drilling for shale gas is currently underway in Lancashire near Blackpool. The company, Cuadrilla, believes that onshore deposits of shale gas in the UK may have been underestimated.
Critics fear this is industry hype, but Cuadrilla says the shale gas seam near Blackpool is so thick that it may not need the horizontal fracking (rock fracturing) characteristic of so many deposits in the US. Cuadrilla says vertical fracking may be achievable in Lancashire.
It is the fracking process - creating tiny explosions to shatter hard shale rocks and release gas 10,000 feet underground - that has caused so much controversy in the US. Some householders claim that shale gas leaking into their drinking supply causes tap water to ignite.
The MPs said this looks a case of...

Summary: A Commons committee has urged ministers to support plans for controversial shale gas drilling in the UK.
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Article: The men, aged 36 and 37, were arrested on Monday in the Rotherham area.
South Yorkshire Police said the arrests were part of an investigation into allegations of child sexual exploitation in Rotherham.
Three men, aged 35, 38 and 39, arrested in Goole, East Yorkshire, in November as part of the same inquiry remain on bail.

Summary:


North Korea has conducted a new intercontinental ballistic missile test, South Korea and the Pentagon say.

Article: Sterling fell as low as $1.4618 before recovering slightly in late trading.
Earlier, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) said UK industrial output figures rose by just 0.1% in February from January.
The small increase was below analysts' forecasts for a 0.3% gain.
A number of opinion polls that showed Labour ahead of the Conservatives also unsettled traders.
One said the pound could fall far further if there were to be a prolonged struggle to form a government in the absence of a dominant party.
"A $1.40 level for sterling/dollar is certainly not out of reach if the election aftermath turns ugly," said Steve Barrow, currency strategist at Standard Bank.
Oil and gas production fell sharply, while the construction sector contracted by 0.9% in February, compared with forecasts for a rise of 2%.
The figures suggest the economy has slowed down this year, after a strong showing of 2.8% growth in 2014.
Manufacturing output showed the best growth within the industrial output measure, with a gain of 0.4% in February, bouncing back from its drop of 0.6% in January.
Chris Williamson, chief economist at Markit, said: "Clearly this all bodes ill for economic growth in the opening quarter of the year. It's now looking like the economy slowed, and possibly quite markedly, compared to the 0.6% expansion seen in the closing quarter of 2014.
"The trend should improve in March, however, according to survey data."
The ONS' industrial output data covers 14.6% of the UK economy.
The first official estimate of gross domestic product for the first quarter of the year will be released about a week before the general election.

Summary: The pound has fallen to its lowest level against the dollar for nearly five years on weak UK industrial output figures and uncertainty over the outcome of the election.
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Article: Inquiry chairman Sir John Chilcot said he could see "no realistic prospect" of publication before 7 May.
Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg said the delay was "incomprehensible", while former Conservative leader Iain Duncan Smith called it "disappointing".
Here's what you need to know about the Chilcot Inquiry.
The Chilcot Inquiry is an independent investigation looking into Britain's role in the 2003 Iraq War.
It covers the period in the run-up to the conflict, the military invasion and then the aftermath of the conflict up until 2009.
The Labour government at the time, led by Prime Minister Tony Blair, agreed to British military involvement in the US-led invasion of the country.
The Conservatives backed British involvement in the war but the Liberal Democrats opposed it.
It was controversial because Tony Blair claimed to Parliament that intelligence reports showed Iraq had weapons of mass destruction but none of those weapons were ever found.
In 2009 Prime Minister Gordon Brown announced the inquiry to "learn the lessons" of the conflict in which 179 UK service personnel died.
It was to be led by Sir John Chilcot, a former civil servant.
More than 100 witnesses gave evidence.
They included dozens of politicians, government advisers, civil servants and lawyers involved in the decision to invade Iraq.
One of the main witnesses was Tony Blair who gave evidence over two days in January 2010.
British ambassadors to the US and Iraq also appeared before the inquiry as well as UK intelligence officials and senior military officials.
Evidence began in 2009 and the last public hearing was held on 2 February 2011.
Despite almost four years passing since the inquiry's final public hearing, Sir John Chilcot has now confirmed it will not be published before the General Election in May 2015.
He says the delay is to give the opportunity for several witnesses to reply to criticism of them contained in the report.
Some witnesses claim they only received the documents regarding the criticism just before Christmas.
In order to...

Summary: MPs have reacted angrily to news that the official inquiry into the 2003 Iraq War will not be released until after the general election.
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Article: This was the year when 5,650 farmers killed themselves in the country.
So the number of suicides by housewives was about four times those by farmers. They also comprised 47% of the total female victims.
Yet the high number of homemakers killing themselves doesn't make front page news in the way farmer suicides do, year after year.
In fact, more than 20,000 housewives have been killing themselves in India every year since 1997, the earliest year for which we have information compiled by the National Crime Records Bureau based on occupation of the victim. In 2009, the grim statistic peaked at 25,092 deaths.
Forget raw numbers.
The rate of housewives taking their lives - more than 11 per 100,000 people - has been consistently higher than India's overall suicide rate since 1997. It dropped to 9.3 in 2014, yet suicide rate for housewives was more than twice those for farmers that year.
Suicide rates of housewives vary from state to state.
In 2011, for example, their rates - more than 20 per 100,000 people - were higher in states like Maharashtra, Pondicherry, Tamil Nadu, Madhya Pradesh, Kerala, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Goa, West Bengal and Gujarat. Punjab, Uttar Pradesh and Bihar showed lower suicide rates.
Peter Mayer, who teaches politics at the University of Adelaide and has spent much time studying the sociology of suicide in India, wonders why suicide rates of housewives in India is so high, and why it gets so little attention in the  media.
After all, as Mr Mayer says, research in western societies suggests that "marriage confers protection from suicide to married women".
Therefore, married people are less likely to kill themselves - studies have found suicide rates for married people in the US and Australia, for example, are lower than others in the same age group.
India, clearly, is an outlier.
Nearly 70% of people who took their lives in 2001, for example, were married - 70.6% of the men and 67% of the women.
A study published in the medical journal The Lancet in 2012 found that the suicide rate in...

Summary: More than 20,000 housewives took their lives in India in 2014.
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Article: The NHS pays pharmacies for extra services on top of the essential functions laid down in their basic contract. But questions have been raised about whether staff are pressurised into over-prioritising these opportunities to boost revenue or may treat them as a lucrative but perfunctory box-ticking exercise.
These services include Medicines Use Reviews (MURs), which assess whether patients are using their medication properly, and the New Medicine Service (NMS), which involves guidance to individuals given a new prescription for certain health conditions.
Under Freedom of Information, we obtained instructions issued to their branches about conducting MURs and NMS from the five largest pharmacy chains (excluding the supermarkets) - Boots, Lloyds, Rowlands, Superdrug and Well. The material includes advice on how to persuade patients to participate and stresses the profits that can be generated.
The documents disclose that Superdrug staff have been told: "Even though the patient has a choice of accepting or declining an MUR, it is important to make sure this is not emphasised during the conversation."
The company's internal advice adds: "At no point should you relate offering the MUR service to the patient as a benefit for the pharmacist or the pharmacy in general."
Superdrug's Best Practice guide for pharmacies urges them not to miss MUR opportunities just to save time when there are other customers waiting in a queue, as that approach "would be detrimental to your pharmacy performance". Instead the other customers should be asked to wait.
Other chains also pay a great deal of attention to the language their employees should use. Rowlands warns its staff offering MURs to "be prepared for KILLER questions" which could make them flustered and speechless.
These include: "Are you making money from this?" - to which the recommended answer is: "The NHS provides a fee to pharmacists for the time we spend on an MUR, which means this is a free service for patients and you will not have to pay anything."
Boots and Lloyds...

Summary: Documents obtained by the BBC reveal the techniques used by large pharmacy companies to maximise their income from providing certain services for the NHS in England.
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Article: A couple with two children needed to each have an income of £20,024 for a minimum income standard, the Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF) said.
This was £263 lower than a year earlier, it said, but those on the minimum wage still fell short.
They had a shortfall of £74 a week on the foundation's measure.
The JRF gathered information from focus groups to set a benchmark for an acceptable standard of living.
Among those features is the view that all working age households would consider a computer and home internet connection as essential.
The group said that lone parents with one child needed an annual income of £26,725, down from £27,073 in 2014.
Both groups saw an income shortfall among families reliant on benefits, it said.
Single people were the only group to see their minimum income requirement fail to fall. In 2015, it stood at £17,102, up slightly from £17,072 in 2014.
Rent rises for these people were swallowing up cuts in taxation and falls in the cost of some items, such as food, in the stores.
Julia Unwin, chief executive of the JRF, said: "After seven years of declining living standards, the pause in rising costs is a very welcome respite.
"But many low-income households are still much worse off than in 2008, leaving them struggling to make ends meet and reliant on benefits to top up their incomes."

Summary: Income needed for an "acceptable" standard of living has fallen slightly for most families compared with a year ago, social policy campaigners say.
###
Article: The missile reached an altitude of about 3,000km (1,865 miles) and landed in the sea off Japan, the Japanese national broadcaster NHK said.
It comes three weeks after North Korea's first ICBM test.
In response, the US and South Korean military conducted a live-firing exercise using surface-to-surface missiles, a US defence official said.
The missiles were fired into the "territorial waters of South Korea along the east coast," a US military statement said.
The latest North Korean missile flew higher, further and for longer than the one in early July. Its launch has been condemned by a number of countries.
The test - the 14th carried out by North Korea in 2017 - is the latest to be conducted in defiance of a UN ban.
US President Donald Trump called it "only the latest reckless and dangerous action by the North Korean regime".
Jeffrey Lewis, a nuclear nonproliferation expert at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies in California, said that initial indications showed the latest missile had a range of about 10,000km - far enough to strike the west coast of the United States and beyond.
The Washington Post reported that Denver and possibly Chicago could now be in North Korea's range.
The latest missile was launched at 23:41 (15:41 GMT) from an arms plant in Jagang province in the north of the country, the Pentagon said.
It is unusual for North Korea to launch a missile at night - the significance is as yet unclear. No missiles had been fired from Jagang province before, indicating a previously-unknown launch site is operational.
Japanese Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga said the missile flew for about 45 minutes - some six minutes longer than the ICBM tested in early July.
NHK said it reached an altitude of about 3,000km - about 200km higher than the previous ICBM. It landed about 1,000km from the launch site, the Pentagon said.
ICBMs can reach altitudes well outside the earth's atmosphere. Using sharp trajectories with high altitudes allows North Korea to avoid firing over neighbouring...

Summary:


Animal rights campaigners are urging a South African game park to reverse its decision to put down a lion who escaped on Sunday.

Article: Tweedbank had been selected as the location for the centre but a site in Galashiels has since emerged.
Scottish Borders Council said a report on the project had to be considered behind closed doors as it contained "commercially sensitive" information.
Both sites are said to be "viable options" but Galashiels may be able to attract more funding.
The meeting of Scottish Borders Council to consider the two potential locations will be held on Thursday.
One site is opposite Tweedbank station while the other is a town centre site in Galashiels - the exact location has not yet been revealed.
Analysis: Giancarlo Rinaldi, BBC news website, south of Scotland reporter
The long-running saga of where to site the Great Tapestry of Scotland may be entering the final furlong at last.
What looked like a certain win for Tweedbank is now being battled out neck-and-neck with Galashiels.
It won't be popular with the public that the meeting to discuss the project is being held behind closed doors.
However, the council has promised a full update following their talks.
They have been tight-lipped about what the ultimate outcome might be but there seem to be some gentle hints of a change of heart.
If I were a betting man, I think I might be having a modest wager on Galashiels beating Tweedbank by a nose.
Council leader David Parker said: "We are proposing that we proceed to look in further detail at the Galashiels option as this may attract further additional funding that the Tweedbank project could not access and it would also act as a significant town centre regeneration project.
"Siting the visitor centre in Galashiels town centre would have the potential to unlock substantial benefits for the town, including transforming it into a true visitor destination, which could encourage further positive developments in the town over a number of years.
"The report before members demonstrates that both sites are viable and that the Tweedbank site has a very strong business case."
He said councillors were aware that there was "very strong...

Summary: Councillors are to meet in private to discuss a permanent home for the Great Tapestry of Scotland in the Borders.
###
Article: But the 75-year-old law professor has played a key role in the impeachment proceedings against President Dilma Rousseff.
Under Brazil's constitution, he became acting president after the Senate voted in favour of launching an impeachment trial against Ms Rousseff, suspending her.
Mr Temer is a discreet politician who seems always to be hovering around the centre of everything important, yet - up until now - never in the spotlight.
But recently he has come out of the shadows, as a skilled politician intent on ending the Rousseff presidency and beginning a new era in Brazil.
Mr Temer's most notable achievement as a politician has been to help the country's biggest political party - the PMDB - form coalitions with every president in the past two decades. He is currently party president.
He presided over Brazil's lower house of Congress during the years of the Fernando Henrique Cardoso government (1995-2002), when Brazil underwent a liberal programme of privatisations and opening-up of the economy.
And under Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva (2002-10, known as Lula) and Ms Rousseff, he has played a key role in helping push forward their Workers' Party agenda of state-led investments.
But rather like his party, which has not held outright power for over two decades, Mr Temer has always been a kingmaker, but never king.
Both party and man avoid clear ideological positions, which leaves them in a comfortable position for negotiating their participation in coalitions of any political colour.
As Brazil's political crisis worsened and Ms Rousseff's Workers' Party bore most of the brunt for the many scandals in the country, the PMDB saw an opportunity to finally seize power.
For most of last year, as Ms Rousseff's situation deteriorated, Mr Temer kept a low profile.
But in December, things began to change.
The then-speaker of Brazil's lower house of Congress, Eduardo Cunha, also a PMDB politician, opened impeachment proceedings against Ms Rousseff for allegedly doctoring government public finances - an allegation the president...

Summary: Until recently most Brazilians would have struggled to recognise Michel Temer if they were shown a picture of the vice-president.
###
Article: The 750-year-old Black Book of Carmarthen is the first Welsh text to include medieval figures such as King Arthur and Merlin.
But for hundreds of years never-before-seen poetry and pictures have been hidden to the naked eye.
Now, thanks to high resolution photography and UV lighting, some of its secrets have finally been revealed.
The book, which was written in the priory at Carmarthen, is now owned by and kept at the National Library of Wales in environmentally controlled conditions to protect the fragile text.
The collection of poetry and illustrations was penned by one scribe in the 13th Century who added to it over the years.
It was then passed from owner to owner, with more additions being made in the margins.
Prof Paul Russell, from the University of Cambridge, who has been uncovering the book's secrets, said: "That tradition of adding to it over the years was carried on by subsequent owners, it was a living text that was constantly added to."
But 300 years after it was first written the then owner, believed to be Jaspar Gryffyth, decided to purge the pages of anything that was not original.
Prof Russell added: "This man in the 16th Century went through the book tidying it up. The owner erased a lot of material from the left, right, top and bottom margins. Anything he thought was an addition, he got rid of."
The book was written on vellum - animal skin which has been stretched, dried and smoothed.
Prof Russell believes the person who erased parts of the book used a pumice stone.
He said: "It takes off a slight layer off the surface, but the ink has penetrated a bit further so what we can do is use UV light to bring out that ink.
"On some bits of it you can't recover anything as it has been rubbed so hard."
Although it was suspected there could be some text hidden within the pages, the researchers who first looked at the book under UV light were shocked when they found two faces staring out at them.
Prof Russell said: "It was a scary moment when we turned the page and out popped these faces in the bottom...

Summary: Ghostly faces and snatches of text have been found hiding in one of Wales' oldest and most important books.
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Article: The African National Congress (ANC) warned that the job losses would worsen unemployment.
Mining firms have announced plans to lay off nearly 14,000 workers due to low commodity prices.
South Africa's official unemployment rate stands at around 26%.
The country is a leading producer of platinum and gold.
Speaking at an ANC  meeting in the commercial capital, Johannesburg, the party's influential secretary-general, Gwede Mantashe, called on firms to reconsider their decision as it was "unpatriotic" to cut jobs "every time the behaviour of commodity prices goes down".
A meeting will be held with mining firms to raise the issue, he said.
"If the private sector is not co-operating, then the state is not going to succeed," Mr Mantashe warned.
The industry body, South Africa Chamber of Mine, said companies did not take decisions on cutting jobs lightly.
"We are acutely aware of the impact of job losses on our industry, our communities and our country as a whole," its spokeswoman Charmane Russell told the BBC.
"Where possible, forced job losses are mitigated through alternative arrangements, including transfers, training people in new skills and early retirement," she added.
Last week, UK-based platinum firm Lonmin said it would cut 6,000 jobs as the fall in the platinum price forced it to scale back operations in South Africa.
Anglo American said it would cut a similar number of posts from its operations worldwide.
Most of its operations are in South Africa and South America.

Summary: South Africa's governing party has accused the private sector of being "unpatriotic" following an announcement that mining companies will cut thousands of jobs.
###
Article: Gabriel Sakellaridis said Greece would maintain repayments to its EU-IMF creditors for as long as possible.
He also rejected the idea of possible capital controls that would restrict money transfers and access to savings.
Greece and its creditors must reach a deal within weeks to unlock bailout funds needed to honour debt repayments.
The government, led by the radical-left Syriza party, was elected in January on a pledge to end austerity measures imposed as a condition of its €240bn (£170bn; $263bn) bailout.
€320bn
Greece's debt mountain
€240bn
European bailout
€56bn Greece owes Germany
177% country's debt-to-GDP ratio
25% fall in GDP since 2010
26% Greek unemployment rate
It has spent the past four months trying to reach a deal with creditors in the IMF, the European Union and the European Central Bank to release the final bailout tranche, worth €7.2bn.
However, they have failed to agree over economic reforms being demanded by the creditors.
In a Greek TV interview over the weekend, Mr Voutsis said the repayment money owed in June "will not be given and is not there to be given".
On Monday, however, Mr Sakellaridis said the government wanted to meet its obligations. He also said a deal would soon be reached in talks with creditors.
"That is the government's intention and the target we have set,'' he said. "By the end of May, the start of June, to be able to have a mutually beneficial agreement.''
He also dismissed the possibility of imposing capital controls if repayments were not met, as has recently been suggested by some experts and an opposition MP.
Earlier, Greek Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis also told the BBC that progress was being made towards resolving the deadlock.
"Greece has made enormous strides at reaching a deal," he told the Andrew Marr Show.
"It is now up to institutions to do their bit. We have met them three-quarters of the way, they need to meet us one-quarter of the way."
European stocks fell on Monday after Mr Voutsis's remarks that Athens would struggle to meet its upcoming debt...

Summary: Greece intends to keep repaying its debt, a government spokesman said, days after Interior Minister Nikos Voutsis warned it had run out of funds.
###
Article: The lion, called Sylvester, crawled under an electric fence after heavy rains dislodged earth, according to a Karoo National Park spokeswoman.
The park authorities intend to use a helicopter to find the lion.
He was fitted with a tracking collar after he was on the loose for three weeks last year.
More on this and other African news stories
The park authorities said on Wednesday that they were still considering five options, only one of which was to kill the lion.
Other options were to bring the lion back to the park and improve the fencing.
They said the previous decision to kill Sylvester had been made prematurely.
On Tuesday night South Africa National Parks tweeted that it was a difficult decision to put down the lion once they find him.
The hashtag #SaveSylvester has been trending in South Africa since Wednesday morning.
Last June, Sylvester went on a sheep-killing spree, wandering 300km (180 miles) before he was found taking a nap by rangers and airlifted from the Nuweveld Mountains in Western Cape.
On his current escape, he has already travelled at least 20km (12 miles) and killed a cow, according to AFP news agency.
Meanwhile in Kenya, another lion was shot dead by a ranger on Wednesday after he escaped from a park in Nairobi.
Several lions have escaped from the park in recent weeks.

Summary:


Australia's economy grew at a better-than-expected 0.9% in the first quarter of 2015, compared to the previous quarter, boosted by mining together with financial and insurance services.

Article: The ad triggered the devices to read out information about the burgers from online encyclopaedia Wikipedia.
However, somebody edited Wikipedia to describe the Whopper as the "worst hamburger product" and another added cyanide to the list of ingredients.
The BBC understands the ad was blocked.
Google did not publicly confirm this, saying only that it had "no involvement" in the campaign.
But Burger King confirmed to the BBC that after the first iteration of the ad was blocked, it ran a tweaked version on US TV.
According to a Burger King spokeswoman, the new ad was revoiced using a "different intonation" that bypassed the ban.
In the 15-second advert, a Burger King employee asks "OK, Google. What is the Whopper burger?"
The stunt has put Wikipedia in the spotlight after reports that Burger King's own marketing team edited the Whopper page shortly before the ad campaign.
The history of the page shows that changes were made on 4 April by Burger King Corporation. It edited the description of the product to include the lines "America's favourite burger" and "100% beef with no preservatives".
This change was quickly re-edited back to the original version.
Wikipedia has not responded to requests for comment.
Whether Burger King expected users to go on to make their own, less flattering edits is unclear but Emily Tan, technology editor at marketing news website Campaign, thinks it might have been aware such a reaction was likely.
"Burger King has a reputation as quite a provocative brand and the idea that users are hijacking a brand can charm and amuse people. There is a chance that Burger King expected this to happen," she said.
However, she thought it was less likely they expected the backlash from users about the intrusive nature of such adverts.
"People didn't like this invading their living rooms. Studies suggest that people feel quite close to these smart speaker devices, they become a personality, and when something you regard as your friend pipes up with information that you didn't ask for, that creeps people...

Summary: A Burger King TV advert which was designed to activate Google Home smart speakers and some Android phones to describe its Whopper burgers has been hijacked by members of the public.
###
Article: Since 2000 the tournament has culminated in March, with Ross County and Hibernian meeting in this season's final at Hampden next month.
Plans for a competition reformat were announced last year, beginning in July and with group stages introduced.
It has also been confirmed that the planned three-week winter break for the Premiership will start immediately after the new-year fixture round.
Top-flight teams will return to action in the Scottish Cup fourth round on the weekend of 21 January.
"The Scottish League Cup semi-finals and final will again be contested before the end of the year, which we know is something a large number of supporters and stakeholders, including the media, were very keen on," said Scottish Professional Football League chief executive Neil Doncaster.

Summary: The Scottish League Cup final will return to November from next season.
###
Article: Near the villages of Deputatsky and Pervomaysky, an hour's drive from Chebarkul city, whole families of meteorite hunters are hard at work.
The meteorite passed over the area before reportedly crashing into the Chebarkul lake,  and the snowy fields are covered with human footprints.
The nearby home of the Belizkaya family was filled with soot from their oven after the meteorite explosion, which caused the ceiling to crack.
Initially frightened, now the family calls that day their "rebirth", and have so far found three 1cm-wide meteorite fragments.
"We came with all the family, we do it out of interest, really, this is such a memento of that event," says Elena Belizkaya of the hoard. "We'll keep it at home for now, but if there's a chance to sell it, we'll sell some, of course!"
Meteorite hunters require no particular expertise as the hunt is relatively simple - fragments leave a small crater similar to a mouse's hole. If you find such a hole in a bank of snow you can be fairly certain - it is either a mouse or a meteorite.
The BBC team found four tiny stones within five minutes. Most of those fragments found near Deputatsky are pea-sized, but some can be much bigger - more like golf balls.
The biggest fragment we saw weighed about 100g. It was found by a citizen of Chelyabinsk, who said he had received several offers from friends in Moscow.
"It's like hunting or fishing," said one meteorite hunter. "When you see an animal, your heart starts to beat fast, and when you're fishing - it's like pulling the fishing rod and thinking there's something extraordinary. This is the same - you see a tiny hole, try it, and here it is."
Scientists from the meteorite laboratory at the Russian Academy of Science collecting samples in Chelyabinsk say the more meteorite hunters the merrier, because there are only a couple of days of good weather left for the search.
Any wind or snowfall will destroy meteorite traces, and small fragments will simply not be found until the spring, when the fields will be covered by tall...

Summary: Russia's Chelyabinsk region is gripped by a kind of meteor fever, with thousands combing through fields trying to find meteorite fragments.
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Article: The first classes giving pointers on how to avoid online frauds are being held in Aberdeen.
The sessions have been organised by Police Scotland and Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service (COPFS).
Cyber scamming includes frauds that use email, websites, chatrooms and message boards.
The first classes for over-60s are being held in Aberdeen's Stratosphere.
They are being led by Silver City Surfers, an organisation which runs monthly sessions for its members and promotes computer literacy among older people.
David Bernard, COPFS equality ambassador for age, said: "Criminals profiting from others is particularly detestable when they prey on the more vulnerable in our society.
"This class is to educate the older generation on the issue of cyber scamming, raise their awareness of such scams and provide information on how to avoid falling foul to these scams.
"The hope is that through education we can both prevent them from being victims of those crimes but also inspire confidence that the criminal justice system in Scotland will listen to them and take action."
Det Insp Eamonn Keane added: "Police Scotland encourage and embrace technology in communication and engagement with all communities and recognise the internet as an intrinsic part of people's lifestyle.
"We welcome this opportunity to educate and improve awareness amongst all communities to prevent crime and reduce opportunities for criminal exploitation."

Summary: Older people have been offered advice on the dangers of cyber scamming in a pilot project that could be rolled out across Scotland.
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Article: Patients have died when surgeons have removed the wrong organ, left instruments inside the body, or even operated on the wrong patient.
In 2008 the World Health Organization launched the Surgical Safety Checklist to counter human errors like these. Studies showed it was so effective in reducing complications that many hospitals quickly adopted it.
But although it was developed as a global tool, it has proved harder to roll out in poorer countries.
The Lifebox Foundation is training staff in one Rwandan hospital how to use the checklist, and hope to roll out the training to the rest of the country's 45 hospitals.
So what are the questions that could save your life?
Incredible as it sounds, surgical teams don't always operate on the right patient, with an estimated 200-300 'wrong-person' operations taking place in the USA each year.
Checking the right person is on the operating table is so critical that it is on the list twice: once before the patient goes under anaesthetic and again before the incision is made.
A UK hospital trust recently performed eye surgery on the wrong patient, despite the Surgical Safety Checklist being compulsory in UK hospitals since 2010.
It's not enough just to have the checklist to hand. The questions seem simple but using the list properly means really thinking each step through, says Dr Iain Wilson, a consultant anaesthetist who was involved in the development of the checklist.
"If you create a 'tickbox culture' it doesn't necessarily get introduced in the right spirit. It's a problem if you move the focus from the patient to the procedure."
This is another double-check on the list.
'Wrong-site' operations are, not surprisingly, more common when there's a choice of left or right.
In a case where a man died when his only healthy kidney was removed, the surgeon said he studied the X-ray the wrong way round before the operation.
In Rwanda, where very few hospitals currently use the checklist, an elderly man went in for an operation for his fractured right hip. He woke up some time...

Summary: Making a series of simple checks such as ensuring that the correct patient is on the table and operating on the right part of the body, could help surgical teams save almost half a million lives a year across the world.
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Article: Forecasts were for quarterly growth of between 0.5% and 0.7%.
Official statistics also showed that household consumption expenditure boosted the quarterly growth numbers.
But economist Shane Oliver told the BBC the numbers were "well below potential".
On an annual basis the economy expanded 2.3%, beating expectations for 2.1%.
Economic growth in the March quarter of 2014 was 2.9%.
"The March quarter GDP [gross domestic product] growth was far better than feared just a few days ago," said Mr Oliver, who is chief economist with AMP Capital in Sydney.
"However, Australia is still not out of the woods, as annual growth at 2.3% is well below potential, and a full 0.8% percentage points of the 0.9% growth came from higher inventories and trade."
He said domestic demand remained "very weak with consumer spending and home construction only just offsetting the ongoing slump in mining investment".
"So the Australian economy has not crashed - as many had feared would happen after the end of the mining boom - but it is continuing to grow at a sub par pace," he added.
Australia's economy has been adjusting to a post mining-boom landscape. It saw its economy grow 0.5% in the October to December 2014 period from the quarter before, when growth was 0.4%.
On Tuesday, the country's central bank, the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA), did not cut its lending rates further to help boost the economy, despite pressure from businesses to do so.
The decision saw Australian stocks fall 1.72% as investors saw little hope of a further cut in the near future.
However, Evan Lucas from IG Markets in Melbourne said "the collapse of [Australian stocks] on the back of the RBA not having an explicit easing bias... was a bit of an overreaction".
In May, the RBA cut its benchmark lending rate by 25 basis points to an all-time low of 2%.
Rising property prices in Australia's biggest city, Sydney, a strong currency and a drop in iron ore prices were among the reasons for the cut.
The May rate cut was the second this year, following a previous 25...

Summary:


The safety of services at a trust running two hospitals has been rated "inadequate" by a health watchdog.

Article: Lord Hardie said he wanted to hear from anyone affected by the failure to complete the project on time and on budget.
His team is already sifting through five million official documents.
Lord Hardie said: "The Edinburgh Tram Inquiry must base its findings on direct evidence from those affected by the planning and construction phase."
He added: "Whether a local resident, business, developer or other interested party, this is the public's opportunity to offer views on the direction of the inquiry and to provide evidence for consideration."
Trams started running last year on the 8.7-mile (14km) route between Edinburgh's New Town and Edinburgh Airport, which cost Â£776m to build.
An inquiry into the project was commissioned by Scottish ministers in June 2014. Its terms of reference are to:
In November last year, the Scottish government announced Lord Hardie's investigation was to become a statutory inquiry.
This gave him the power to compel individuals and organisations to co-operate.
In a BBC interview, Lord Hardie said the move was necessary because some people had refused to co-operate, or had failed to respond to his requests.
The deadline for submitting written evidence to the inquiry is 4 August.

Summary: The man in charge of the Edinburgh tram inquiry has called for help from the public.
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Article: The planet's climate has constantly been changing over geological time. The global average temperature today is about 15C, though geological evidence suggests it has been much higher and lower in the past.
However, the current period of warming is occurring more rapidly than many past events. Scientists are concerned that the natural fluctuation, or variability, is being overtaken by a rapid human-induced warming that has serious implications for the stability of the planet's climate.
The greenhouse effect refers to the way the Earth's atmosphere traps some of the energy from the Sun. Solar energy radiating back out to space from the Earth's surface is absorbed by atmospheric greenhouse gases and re-emitted in all directions.
The energy that radiates back down to the planet heats both the lower atmosphere and the surface. Without this effect, the Earth would be about 30C colder, making our planet hostile to life.
Scientists believe we are adding to the natural greenhouse effect with gases released from industry and agriculture (known as emissions), trapping more energy and increasing the temperature. This is commonly referred to as global warming or climate change.
The most important of these greenhouse gases in terms of its contribution to warming is water vapour, but concentrations show little change and it persists in the atmosphere for only a few days.
On the other hand, carbon dioxide (CO2) persists for much longer (it would take hundreds of years for it to return to pre-industrial levels). In addition, there is only so much CO2 that can be soaked up by natural reservoirs such as the oceans.
Most man-made emissions of CO2 are through the burning of fossil fuels, as well as through cutting down carbon-absorbing forests. Other greenhouse gases such as methane and nitrous oxide are also released through human activities, but their overall abundance is small compared with carbon dioxide.
Since the industrial revolution began in 1750, CO2 levels have risen by more than 30% and methane levels have risen more...

Summary: BBC News looks at what we know and don't know about the Earth's changing climate.
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Article: The High Negotiations Committee (HNC) says it will now wait for his Tuesday's talks with the government team to hear its response on humanitarian issues.
The HNC says an end to sieges and the bombing of civilians is a precondition for the indirect peace talks.
The Syrian government has said the opposition is not serious about peace.
More than 250,000 people have died in almost five years of war in Syria.
Eleven million others have fled their homes as forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad and those opposed to his rule battle each other, as well as jihadist militants from so-called Islamic State (IS).
"I believe we received very positive messages from the special envoy and tomorrow he will have a meeting with the regime side and we will see wait for a reply from him," HNC spokesman Salim al-Muslat was quoted as saying by Reuters late on Monday.
Talks aimed at finding a political solution to the Syrian conflict were due to begin in earnest at the Palais des Nations in Geneva on Monday, with representatives of the warring parties sitting in separate rooms and UN officials shuttling between them.
However, Mr de Mistura's office said his morning appointment with the government's delegation had been rescheduled because he first wanted to have an official meeting with the HNC delegation in the Swiss city.
The envoy only paid an informal visit to the HNC negotiators' hotel on Sunday, when he was reported to have made a proposal based on their demands.
The Syrian opposition delegation's meeting with Staffan de Mistura marks the official start of the talks in Geneva, as the UN special envoy met the government's representatives on Friday.
There are immense diplomatic efforts taking place behind the scenes to ensure these talks are successful, but they could easily be derailed.
The opposition High Negotiation Committee says it may pull out if the government does not stop its attacks on civilians. It cites the bombardment of the Damascus suburb of Muadhamiya on Sunday and the attack on a refugee camp in the north on...

Summary: Syria's main opposition umbrella group says it had a "positive" meeting with the UN special envoy Staffan de Mistura at peace negotiations in Geneva.
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Article: The Samsung Z will go on sale in Russia in the July-to-September quarter.
Most Samsung phones currently use the Android platform, but the South Korean firm has been working with chipmaker Intel to develop Tizen as an alternative operating system.
It is seen as a way to make Samsung less dependent on Android's developer, Google.
"It enables Samsung to hedge its bets much better compared to some of its rivals," Andrew Milroy, a vice president with consulting firm Frost & Sullivan, told the BBC.
"However, it is unlikely to make a significant dent on the Android market share."
The company will show off the phone at the Tizen Developer Conference, being held this week in San Francisco.
It did not disclose the device's price.
Samsung is currently the world's best-selling Android device manufacturer.
However, many other rivals such as HTC, Sony, LG and Huawei also use the operating system to power some of their devices.
As the competition in the smartphone sector increases, and growth rates slow, Samsung has been looking at ways to maintain its lead over rivals.
One of the areas that Samsung has been working on is Tizen - a new open source operating system for its gadgets.
"Samsung is seeking to integrate its own components, displays, software and services," said Ian Fogg from the IHS consultancy.
"Using Android makes the firm dependent on Google, meaning its ability to differentiate its products is less strong than if it had installed its own operating system.
"But by going down the Tizen route, the risk is the firm doesn't have enough high quality apps available to make the devices good enough for consumers."
Samsung has taken steps to try to encourage software creators.
It said that in order to "encourage more developers to join, the Tizen Store would provide a special promotional program to all developers for one year".
Having its own app store could help Samsung generate more revenue from app downloads.
That is because currently customers who purchase apps on Android-powered phones typically funnel revenue to...

Summary: Samsung Electronics has launched the world's first smartphone powered by the Tizen operating system.
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Article: Twitter has sent some high profile users a message, suggesting they stop posting photos from Instagram.
As reported by Mashable, the alert suggested posting photos directly to Twitter would ensure "your fans always see them".
Instagram photos have not been viewable within tweets since 2012.
The in-app alert featured a fake "superstar" account showing a link from Instagram and a photo posted directly to Twitter, appearing within the tweet itself.
Instagram's move to stop allowing its posts to be seen within tweets in December 2012 was seen as an attempt to drive more traffic to its own app.
At around the same time, Twitter began offering filters and photo editing features of its own.
The latest move by Twitter could suggest an attempt to draw celebrities away from its Facebook-owned rival.
Instagram announced in December 2014 that it now has 300 million active monthly users compared to Twitter's most recent count of 284m.
It is also a reminder of Twitter's growth as a multimedia platform.
Multiple photos can be posted within tweets and YouTube links appear as embedded video.
Twitter is also planning to allow users to post video from within its app alongside its short-form video sharing app Vine.
With many celebrities attracting a big following across social media, Twitter is clearly attempting to position itself as the first choice for their photos.
Follow @BBCNewsbeat on Twitter, BBCNewsbeat on Instagram, search BBC Newsbeat on Facebook and Radio1Newsbeat on YouTube

Summary: It's either a helpful tip for people with a big following or the latest blow in the battle between two social networks.
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Article: The Care Quality Commission (CQC) made a number of recommendations including ensuring nursing staffing levels were safe at Sandwell General Hospital and City Hospital in Birmingham.
It also called for improvements in A&E, medical care and surgery.
Sandwell and West Birmingham Hospitals NHS Trust said it is "working hard already to address the issues".
Care at the trust was given an overall rating of "requires improvement".
The CQC said: "The trust was rated as 'inadequate' with regard to whether [it] was always providing a service that is safe."
Source: CQC inspection between 14-17 and 25-30 October
The trust said the report made for  "difficult reading".
Chief executive Toby Lewis said: "The areas of improvement identified in the report are not a surprise to us at the trust, even where they are disappointing, or make difficult reading."
CQC's chief inspector, Prof Sir Mike Richards, said: "While we witnessed areas of good practice it is clear that the trust has work to do to make improvements which are sustainable long term."
Inspectors will return to check whether the necessary changes have taken place and the CQC will continue to monitor the trust "closely".
Mr Lewis said: "During the CQC visit, inspectors saw some individual examples of poor practice in some departments around hand washing, security of medicines and completion of patient records."
He said these individual examples "are not acceptable" and it is up to the trust leadership to ensure it gets "the basics right, first time, every time for every patient".

Summary: